Buon appetito!

Jessica and I have taken on a new quest today:

A 10 week Italian cooking class, "The Color Palate of Italy", an introduction to Italian cuisine, that starts with the learning of core ingredients and works its way through the classic parts of the Italian table.

As I'm sure you have all learned from reading our blog, Jessica and I have come to consider ourselves pretty big food connoisseurs of the cuisine here in Argentina (especially since we tend to eat, well, A LOT of it). Since we have now been here 8 weeks (56 days) and have only used our kitchen twice, we decided it was time to tighten our wallets and get down to some home cooking. After deciding to start cooking at home we came across another problem: the fact that neither Jessica and I know how to cook very well! Therefore, we turned to our favorite go to food bloggers here in Argentina, SaltShaker, and signed ourselves up for their private lesson classes. Tom, the man behind the blog, runs a restaurante de puertas cerradas, or closed door restaurant, which are actually very common here in Argentina. Basically what these chefs do is open their homes to the public for a private dining experience and an amazingly delicious and unique experience. Tom and the fellow Saltshaker crew also blog about the restaurants here in the area and since our arrival, Jessica and I have found ourselves frequenting their site before trying out new places ourselves.

Today we had our first class which started out with an olive oil tasting, learning the difference between the way they are made, the difference between virgin and extra virgin, and how the US is the only country that refuses to follow the National Food Standard for olive oil... therefore we learned the olive oil produced in the US doesn't even need to be made of olives!! (So check those labels when you're at the grocery store and don't settle for any old olive oil...) Next we moved to the kitchen where we did a tasting of some different herbs (parsley, mint, rosemary, basil), garlic (sauteed, fried, fresh, poached), and cheeses (provolone, mozzarella, pecorino, and parmesan). Next we were taught how to make our very own homemade ricotta cheese which was absolutely amazing (tastes nothing like the store-bought!).

Next on the agenda came the cooking.... On the menu for today:

- An egg omelette filled with the fresh ricotta, parmesan, and parsley, topped with a fresh tomato, garlic, and basil sauce

- Pasta with an olive oil sauce made with onions and chilies

- Caprese salad with a homemade pesto sauce

MUY BUENISIMO!

Find our entire class schedule below:

October 13 – Core Ingredients – herbs, olive oils, cheeses, garlic – an intensive tasting, plus a lunch featuring these – plus knife sharpening and basic knife skills

October 20 – Pasta – basics of pasta making followed by a lunch of our efforts

October 27 – Pizza – from piadinas to grilled pizzas to Sicilian style to focaccia – it’s a bit of a carbo-loading day, but delicious

November 3 – Grains – working with risotto, polenta and farro, the classic whole grain dishes of Italy

November 10 – Contorni – we’ll work on four classic vegetable side dishes that will make your main courses shine

November 17 – Fish & Shellfish – a trio of recipes from the sea, some of our favorite cooking

November 24 – Poultry – if it flies, it’s fair game for this class – one of our past students’ favorites

December 1 – No class

December 8 – Beef & Pork – we can’t pass up these staples of both Italian and local cuisine, can we?

December 15 – Game – this class always depends on the season and what game is available, and is one of the more creative classes of the series

December 22 – Offal – a little nose to tail dining, with a look at some of those “parts is parts” – always a surprising class, usually because no one expects to enjoy it, and then they do!